Noa Tishby

Noa Tishby is an Israeli actress, producer, writer, and activist whose career has spanned entertainment and public advocacy. She was born on May 22, 1975, in Tel Aviv, Israel. Tishby began performing as a teenager, gaining early recognition at age 16 for her lead role in the original musical King David (also referred to as David). She later received a full scholarship to study at the National Museum of Arts.

Her breakout television role came in the mid-1990s on Ramat Aviv Gimmel, Israel’s highest-rated prime-time drama, which made her a household name. Over the following years, she appeared in numerous Israeli television shows, films, and theater productions, including a critically acclaimed performance as Anita in the Israeli National Theater’s production of West Side Story. She also launched a music career, releasing Nona, the first English-language album by an Israeli artist to reach No. 1 on the national charts, later released in Japan by Virgin Records.

In the early 2000s, Tishby relocated to Los Angeles to pursue work in the American entertainment industry. She acted in feature films such as The Island (2005) and Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (2009), as well as television series including Big Love (HBO) and The Deep End (ABC). As a producer, she made history by selling the Israeli series BeTipul (In Treatment) to HBO, marking the first Israeli television show adapted for American audiences. Serving as co-executive producer, she helped produce over 150 episodes, earning a Peabody Award and multiple Emmy and Golden Globe nominations.

Beyond entertainment, Tishby has been active in pro-Israel advocacy for over a decade. In 2011, she founded Act for Israel, the country’s first online advocacy and rapid-response organization. She also co-founded initiatives such as Reality Israel and Eighteen, an institute aimed at combating anti-Semitism and fostering Jewish pride. Her activism led to frequent appearances on major media outlets and speaking engagements at venues including the U.S. Capitol, where she testified before congressional committees on anti-Semitism, terrorism financing, and gender-based violence in the aftermath of the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack.

In April 2022, Tishby was appointed as Israel’s first-ever Special Envoy for Combating anti-Semitism and the Delegitimization of Israel, a position she held until 2023. She has been recognized as one of the “50 Most Powerful Jews in the World” and featured in The Hollywood Reporter’s “Women in Power” list.

Tishby is also an author. Her first book, Israel: A Simple Guide to the Most Misunderstood Country on Earth (2021), explains Israel’s history and complexities in accessible terms. It became a New York Times bestseller, as did her second book, Uncomfortable Conversations with a Jew (2024), co-written with Emmanuel Acho.

She has one son, Ari, born in 2015, and divides her time between Los Angeles and Tel Aviv.

Source: “Noa Tishby,” congress.gov.
“About Noa Tishby,” noatishby.com.
“Noa Tishby Biography,” imdb.com.
“Noa Tishby,” Simon & Schuster.
“Noa Tishby Bio,” jnf.org

Photo: Alon Shafransky, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.